Earth Day - Wonk Style

Colorado Governor Bill Ritter continued with his ambitious environmental agenda by issuing three executive orders on Tuesday.

• Executive Order D 004 08 establishes reduction goals for greenhouse gas emissions (20 percent by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050, both from 2005 levels); directs the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) to develop regulations mandating the reporting of greenhouse gas emissions; and requests the Public Utilities Commission to require each utility under its jurisdiction to submit electric resource plans that include an analysis showing how the utility could achieve a 20 percent reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions from 2005 levels by 2020.
• Executive Order D 010 08 establishes an agricultural sequestration offset program.
• Executive Order B 007 08 establishes a Colorado Climate Advisory Panel.

Also today, Gov. Ritter announced the "Insulate Colorado" program to help homeowners insulate their homes and reduce energy consumption. With 44 statewide partners, Insulate Colorado will provide rebates to participating homeowners up to $300 per project.

Gov. Ritter also announced the first 13 founding Colorado reporters to The Climate Registry. The voluntary registry will "Assist in measuring, tracking and verifying emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), the gases that cause climate change. It will also provide the measurement and reporting infrastructure to support voluntary, mandatory, market-based and emissions reduction." Those signers are:

American Energy Assets
Cameron-Cole, LLC
Hogan and Hartson
Kleinfelder, Inc.
Newmont Mining Corporation
Platte River Power Authority
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)
Shell Oil Company
State of Colorado
Suncor Energy (USA) Inc.
Symbiotic Engineering, LLC
Tri-State Generation and Transmission
Xcel Energy

Gov. Ritter's Press Release

Did CSU Name Their New 'Clean Energy Supercluster' Biz After an Oilfield Logistics Company?

One of my almae matres, Colorado State University has finally launched the business-end of its long-awaited renewable energy "supercluster." The supercluster will serve as a clean tech incubator, moving research and development of clean energy and energy efficiency from the lab to the marketplace. CSU President Larry Penley joined Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter and Colorado Senators Wayne Allard and Ken Salazar to make the announcement Thursday at the state Capitol.

"CSU is home to the world's finest faculty and student brain trust in the environmental sciences, in the development of alternative energy technology and biofuels and in the management of state forest lands," said CSU President Penley. "In the long run, all these achievements are insufficient if we can't get our research to market rapidly and in ways that are sustainable from a business perspective," Penley said.


The university's new business arm of the Clean Energy Supercluster took the painfully ironic name, Cenergy. Not to be confused with the large corporation of the same name, that provides logistical support for onshore and offshore oilfields worldwide. You'd think that someone at the university would have done a Google search on the name 'Cenergy' before getting the new stationery printed!

These are supposed to be researchers we're talking about, right?

Photo: Tim Hurst
Press Release
Colorado State University Clean Energy Supercluster

What are the Alternatives to Electricity Rate Hikes?

Ft. Collins, CO – The electric co-op that serves over 30,000 residential and business customers in rural portions of Larimer, Weld, and Boulder counties in Northeast Colorado, has increased its electricity rates 24 percent over the last three years. But the Poudre Valley Rural Electric Association (PVREA) is hardly alone. In response to these un-relenting rate hikes and over-reliance on coal-fired power, the Colorado non-profit group PV-Pioneers, has proposed an alternative plan that would encourage reductions in demand by focusing on energy efficiency and the principle of avoided costs.

The proposed plan suggests that the REA could finance Home Energy Makeovers for members who need them the most, and can afford them least. REAs and co-ops are in a position to make these loans because of their ability to secure no-interest federal loans themselves. The program would allow structural energy efficiency improvements including permanent housing weatherization improvements, replacement of inefficient appliances, or even just the replacement of incandescent with compact fluorescent or LED lighting.

PVREA's current assistance program - like many energy assistance programs across the country - help people pay their bills when they cannot afford to pay themselves. These programs can be incredibly helpful. But the problem is they create little incentive to permanently reduce those bills. They really mask the problem, rather than addressing some of the root causes.

This program is being presented as an alternative to rate increases that PVREA will have to absorb if its wholesale provider, Tri-State G&T continues its search to find somewhere to build a new coal-fired power plant. Just last month, Tri-State made national headlines when they, along with Sunflower Electric of Kansas, were denied an air permit by the Kansas Department of Health for a proposed expansion of the Holcomb coal-fired power plant in Southwestern Kansas.

The PV-Pioneers is a Colorado non-profit group made up of Poudre Valley Rural Electric Association members from Larimer, Weld, and Boulder counties. The group works to keep future rates down, to promote energy efficiency programs and to facilitate the generation of locally abundant renewable energy resources.
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Straw Poll: How much do you pay for electricity?

In light of my most recent post about the so-called "externalities" of coal-fired power, I thought I might add a participatory element the discussion that'll add some context. So, in the name of 'science' please visit ecopolitology (if you're not already here) and answer one simple poll question: How much do you pay for your electricity? (2 seconds and no strings!)

If you don't know, look at your most recent electric bill. Otherwise you can probably find your rates online. I encourage and welcome votes from all cities, counties, states, provinces, territories and countries. Thanks!

Source: Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-861, “Annual Electric Power Industry Report.”(2006)

Denial of Kansas Plant Seen as Opportunity for Co-ops

TOPEKA, Kan. – Supporters of a proposed coal-fired power plant in Kansas that would provide power to most parts of rural Colorado are working to revive it after the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) became the first government agency in the United States to cite carbon dioxide emissions as the reason for rejecting an air permit for a proposed coal-fired electricity generating plant. Tri-State Generation and Transmission’s partner in the project, Sunflower Electric, has filed papers with the KDHE Secretary Rod Bremby to reconsider his rejection of the air permit.

In the written decision to deny the Tri-State/Sunflower permit last Friday, Secretary Bremby said that “it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing.” Sunflower and Tri-State have already begun the appeal process. "We are disappointed with the Secretary's arbitrary and capricious action," said Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer.

I see the denial of the air permit as an opportunity for Tri-State's 44 member owned co-ops to seize opportunities in efficiency and renewable energies. Not only is Northern Colorado blessed with excellent wind, solar, and biomass resources that can all be harnessed to make clean, reliable, and cost-effective energy, much the same can be said for most of Tri-State's coverage area. Tri-State needs to see the writing on the wall that carbon-emission legislation is coming, and that it is only a matter of time before we are living in a carbon-constrained world. In stead of frittering away member-owners' valuable resources fighting for the construction of new coal-fired power plants, Tri-State should be investing in efficiency, smart-grid technologies, distributed generation, and other ways in which its many members can directly capitalize on the new energy economy.

Exactly how the co-ops will be able to take advantage of the upcoming energy legislation remains to be seen. Rumors continue to swirl that the final bill may be only a skeleton of its former self. I am not playing prognosticator here, but it is quite possible there may be no RPS, no solar tax credit, no extension of the federal production tax credit, and only a meager increase in CAFE standards. I believe that something useful will be passed out of the legislature, I'm just a little skeptical about how many of those good things will make it.

Yet there may be one kernel of hope for renewable energy that is tucked away in the otherwise much-maligned farm bill that would grow renewables by incentivizing distributed microgeneration through a tax credit for small wind. More on this later this week...

Photo Credits:
1. Brian Brainerd, Denver Post

Ditch Your Dryer, Save the World: Civic Greenwashing

Media coverage of issues related to global climate change and resource conservation has been steadily increasing over the last few years. Articles and advertisements ranging from how to green your back-to-school purchases to where to buy the best free-range, organic, pesticide-free, sustainably-produced, and "natural" products have become commonplace as consumers are bombarded with suggestions that buying some sort of product or another will somehow have the cumulative effect of saving the planet. In a world where eco-friendliness is increasingly obscured by corporate greenwashing, it can be refreshing to see media coverage of issues that don't necessarily equate buying things with environmental beneficence. On that note, and in terms of a different type of greenwashing altogether, the Fort Collins Coloradoan ran a story about how some people in the Choice City choose to hang dry their clothes, and how one man's efforts to save some money might just save the world [Alright, now that I've got your attention, I apologize for hamming it up a bit much; and I won't exactly be saving the world, but you should really read on]. The following was excerpted from a piece written by reporter Kelli Lackett from the Fort Collins Coloradoan on 8/11/2007:

Tim Hurst, a 35-year-old graduate student at Colorado State University, has been using a clothesline exclusively for the past five years. He said he started hanging his clothes on the line because the dryer was broken. "Primarily I was too lazy to get it fixed. But now it's more about the environmental impact. Third, it's about saving money on the electric bill," Hurst said. "On the really nice hot sunny days, the lightweight clothes dry in under half an hour." Hurst lives west of Horsetooth Reservoir where no one objects to hanging clothes on the line “You can look around and several houses around here have clothes hanging out,” he said...

(I like how they included my comment about being too lazy to get the drier fixed. I had a feeling when those words slipped out of my mouth they would end up in the paper.)